He dropped the water bottle and ran for the door.
“Now that’s some mighty fine chicken noodle. Just can’t get that on Olympus.”
Theron spun around and stared at a small, elderly woman dressed in white diaphanous robes who hadn’t been in the kitchen moments before, sitting at the table eating a bowl of soup. He recognized the face. Atropos, the third of the three Fates. And there was only one reason she could be here now.
Ah, gods. Not yet. Not now. Not before he’d had a chance to tell Acacia that he loved her.
“Bah,” she muttered, lifting the spoon to her mouth. “Atropos only likes minestrone. And Clotho won’t eat anything with meat in it. This”—she grinned—“this is the good stuff.”
Not Atropos?
The lines around her mouth and eyes crinkled as she looked up at him. “Of course I’m not. Do I look like that old hag? And Clotho spins the thread, sonny, she doesn’t stretch it. So that leaves—”
“Lachesis.”
She grinned. “You get the golden ticket.”
“Wh-What are you doing here?” You didn’t question a Fate. To have one visit you was a sacred experience, even if it was the one come to snip the thread of your lifeline—which, thank Zeus, this one was not.
“I thought I was going to have to intervene again,” Lachesis said, “considering how blockheaded you can be, but it looks like you’ve finally figured it all out on your own.”
“Intervene? Again?”
“Come now, you didn’t think that sweet little girl was making things up, did you?”
Sweet girl—Marissa. In the village.
Links fell into place. In a rush, he realized this was his one chance to find out what fate had in store for him. “The Argonauts—”
“Need a good leader,” she said, ditching her smile and growing serious. “And your woman is right. That isn’t Zander or Demetrius or any of the others. Only you can lead them, Theron. This war will get bloody, and many will die on both sides of the world. But if you choose not to lead them, then loss is guaranteed.”
His shoulders sagged at the enormity of what she was placing on him. “How do you know I can do it?”
“Because you’re of Heracles’s line. You can do anything. You’ve found your humanity now, thanks to your woman, and that makes you an even better leader, because now you feel. Never question your ability or what destiny has called you to do. This is your Star Wars moment, my son. Stand up and do what you were meant to do.”
His brow wrinkled. “Star Wars?”
She rolled her eyes. “While you’re at it, try some pop culture on for size. If you want to lead your people, Theron, you need to be able to connect with them. You’ll find most Argoleans are as hungry for human culture as you are for that woman of yours.”
She sat up straighter. “And speaking of that woman…you might want to go stop her. She’s just reached the tunnel now.”
He glanced to the door. “She’s my curse.” And my life. Why hadn’t he realized that sooner?
“Of course she is. Why would you think otherwise?”
Why would he indeed?
A smile split his face, and he turned for the door.
“Wait,” Lachesis called. “Don’t you want to hear about—?”
He didn’t wait. Not for anything else. Urgency overwhelmed him, and he tore out of the kitchen and ran through the lodge, skipping down the front steps and sailing across the courtyard past the waterfall and the sea of colonists suddenly turning and staring at him as if he’d lost his mind.
He hadn’t. He’d finally found it. And his heart. And the courage to do what he’d been born to do. “Acacia!”
She was standing near one of the tunnel openings with Nick and Isadora, saying good-bye to Marissa. All of them looked up when he came running at them, but he didn’t care. All he saw was the Misos he’d fallen in love with.
He pushed through the group, gathered her into his arms and kissed her hard and hot with everything he had in him.
When he pulled back, she looked dazed. And so damn sexy, he knew the choice he made now could never be a mistake.
Choice? Who was he kidding? There was never a choice where she was concerned. And thank Hera for that.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Keeping my promise.” He looked up at Nick, standing behind and just to the right of her, eyeing Isadora on Acacia’s other side as if the princess might just jump out and bite him. “We’re going to need your help. Someone on the inside who knows what the Misos need and how best to protect them.”
Nick’s eyes flashed. “Who’s we?”
“The Argonauts.”
Those eyes widened. “I don’t think so.”
Theron glanced down at Acacia, who was smiling at him as though she’d just hit the jackpot and couldn’t believe it. “He’ll do it. You were right. They need me more there than they do here.”